


Like the Rain on the Sea

by Shadaras



Category: The Wind City
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-22
Updated: 2013-11-22
Packaged: 2018-01-02 07:38:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1054194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadaras/pseuds/Shadaras
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-story reflection on death and sadness. Also on moving on and continuing to live. Not as depressing as this makes it sound.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like the Rain on the Sea

**Author's Note:**

> newly published book! you should get it: http://www.steampress.co.nz/wind.html

The sun set over the ocean, across the islands from where they’d met. The look of gold and blood on the water was the same as it always was: a rich red ruinous reminder of the blood and fire that meddling Maui and that mortal man had wrought upon them.

Ariki sat on the high cliffs, staring down at the water below. Oh, it wasn’t right, not really, that he came to the water as the full moon sailed overhead. It never had been, and that had been part of the glory of it, of the slick docks and brine in the air and in his mouth as he—

The patupaiarehe leaned back on his elbows, mouth fighting with the simultaneous urges to smile and sigh. Not quite a year, it had been. Not quite a year since Maui returned to spite them all and had ruined one of the few worthwhile relationships he had ever found.

(And that was why he was here, of course; mourning and remembrance: mourning for the life lost and livelihood left behind, memories of the beauty and aching horror that he had so lovingly crafted and kept.)

The sun touched the water then, burning gold, turning the waves beneath to dark silk and the sky above to fire. Ariki stared at it, refusing to look away, murmuring a soft spell to keep the light from burning his eyes. He’d been burned enough, and this, at least, he could keep guard on.

As the sun slowly sank away, Ariki thought he saw a pod of dolphins swimming in the waves, smooth bodies leaping out of the water, gray darts trying to weave the sky and water into one cloth. If they could succeed in that weaving, they had more magic than the gods themselves, but they were so beautiful in the trying that he couldn’t fault their joy.

One of them looked... Ariki frowned and sat up, squinting past the sun. Yes, that one was far too large for a dolphin. And it was swimming towards him. The next time it crested the water, the patupaiarehe rolled his eyes. “I thought I’d told you to leave me alone,” he muttered, though of course Tony couldn’t hear him yet. “Go stay with the Hikurangi and your city-spirits and that _terrible_ man.”

He didn’t move, though. There wasn’t really any point in leaving, once she’d come for him; if she’d tracked him here, he wouldn’t be able to lose her once more without time for preparation. The taniwha had changed since the last time he’d seen her, turning longer and sleeker; she moved through the water like she belonged there now, like her body was entirely hers and not an alien beast to refuse.

The sun had almost crossed the horizon in full by the time Tony, soaking wet and wearing terribly bright and _human_ clothing, plopped herself down beside Ariki. He gave her a slight nod, and let his lips curve into a slight smile at her silent nod in return. She’d learned something, then, since the last time. Perhaps Hinewai had gotten through to her the message that sometimes, silence is the best salutation one can give.

So he watched the sun set, peripherally aware of the taniwha sitting beside him, swinging booted feet over the cliff’s edge like there was no possibility in the world of sorrow or death.

When the sun set and moon rose, and the sea shone sad silver, Ariki spoke. “Did you come to try and save me?”

“What?” He could _feel_ her jump. “No! No, of course not, why would I do that?”

“I can’t think of another reason why you’d seek me out so far from your home.” Carefully, he reached into a pouch resting next to him, removing with ruined fingers painstakingly carven pieces of wood. Fish, they were, and you could tell that much but no more. His hands that had once wrought war and weaving in equal measure now hated doing such simple things as grasping knives and cutting flesh in half.

“You’re missed.”

“I can’t think of any who would miss the likes of me.”

“Well, I miss you, at least.” Ariki glanced over at her, saw her sitting cross-legged now, chin propped up on both hands. She smiled at him. “Besides, who says you can waste away forever in the far reaches of the ocean? That isn’t even your _place_ , as I understand it.”

Ariki flinched and dropped the tokens he’d almost collected into his hands. “It’s not, no,” he said, short and cross. “Does that matter?”

Tony _hummed_ , of all things.

The patupaiarehe ignored her. She’d speak as she willed. It wasn’t like he had any hope of stopping her; she was a taniwha and did as she liked in defense of her place and her people. And if he was one of hers, then, well, that wasn’t something he’d expected, but he could understand it, more or less.

“The Hikurangi’s rebuilt, y’know.”

“So soon?”

“It helps to have the city on your side.” He could _hear_ her grin, chipper and bright and everything that he very much didn’t want to think about right now. “All the city’s spirits were _fascinated_ by the Hikurangi once they heard what it was. And once I assured them that the old ones wouldn’t hurt them for entering.”

Ariki laughed at the growl she descended to at the end. “It took you longer to convince everyone than to build it, then.”

“Yup!”

He turned back to the sea, hands filled with tokens he’d carved with his heart if not his hands, tokens for a lover lost to fire and infuriating events that should never have been but could not be taken back. Simple things, really, simple representations of a complicated memory and a twisted mind. Perhaps the simplicity made it better, though; it meant he hadn’t been trying to capture the fullness of Whai’s shark-toothed smile and utter abandon. Slowly, he started letting them fall through his fingers, dropping down like rain onto the water, little glowing charms like rain or drops of moonlight on the sea.

“I wish he could see you,” Tony murmured as the last one fell from his hands. “He’d laugh, but he’d appreciate the gesture, I think.”

“You don’t know _anything_ about what he’d think,” Ariki snapped, voice harsh, cold, rough as when he swallowed the sea. “Leave this be.”

“I did know him, y’know.”

“Not so well as I.”

“That doesn’t make my knowing less important.”

She sounded _brittle_. That wasn’t how a taniwha should sound. Ariki turned back to look at Tony, and found her face twisted in what, as he finally processed her words, seemed very much to be the same combination of sorrow and rage as he was no doubt showing.

Ariki breathed out, hissing, and let his ruined fingers clench into fists. “Different knowings, then. But let me mourn as I will this loss, and do not lessen it by imagining him laughing here with us right now.”

She nodded, and the tension eased out of her face as they both turned back to the sea, and the glowing dots slowly sinking into the waves, crashing in and out of the shore in endless refusal to let go, to die.


End file.
